1. FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to the method of preventing solder bridges incurred during wave soldering of components to a circuit board. More particularly, the present invention relates the generation and utilization of solder thieves to minimize the number of solder bridges that occur during wave soldering of components to a circuit board.
2. ART BACKGROUND
Wave soldering is a process by which melted solder is flowed over a surface of a circuit board to concurrently provide solder to a multiplicity of pads on the surface of the circuit board. The wave soldering process consists of flowing melted solder over the surface of the circuit board in waves, such as running the surface of the circuit board across the surface of a small bath of solder. The advantage to this process is speed; however, solder bridges may form between pads. The solder bridges typically occur between the last two pads of a sequence or row of pads. In the past the distance between pads has been large enough to prevent bridges, however, as circuit densities become greater and the center-to-center pin spacing (pin pitch) becomes smaller, there is a greater potential to form bridges.
To repair the solder bridges that are formed during the wave solder process, operators will manually remove the bridge using a soldering iron and solder wick, or a desoldering iron. However, when manufacturing large lots of boards this process can be quite cumbersome, time consuming, and costly. Therefore, it is desirable to provide a technique for minimizing the number of solder bridges that occur during the wave solder process.